Church of Saint George in Streisângeorgiu

The Church of Saint George stands in Streisângeorgiu, a locality belonging to the town of Călan, Hunedoara County. It is a small Romanesque church, regarded as one of the oldest medieval buildings in Transylvania still in use. A Slavonic inscription found in the sanctuary records that the church was made in 1313-1314 for "knyaz Balea" and "priest Naneș", with painting by "Teofil the painter". Excavations showed that a wooden church with the same plan and dimensions stood on the site earlier, and the surrounding graves date from the twelfth to thirteenth centuries. In the mid-eighteenth century the church came under the jurisdiction of the Greek Catholic bishop Ioan Inocențiu Micu-Klein, according to the inscription of 1743. A west porch added in the eighteenth or nineteenth century was demolished during the 1970s restoration. The interior mural painting survives from three phases: the original of 1313-1314, repainted in 1409 and 1743. Roman stone slabs taken from a nearby villa rustica are visible in the walls, both outside and inside. The church is a Category A historic monument, LMI code HD-II-m-A-03454, and is an Orthodox church.